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If You Need Answers, You Need an Altar

Many believers find themselves working hard, praying quickly, and sacrificing time and energy yet feel stuck without answers. This is not new. In 1 Kings 18, the people of Israel were crying out to false gods, sacrificing daily, and still living in drought and famine. They had a worship routine, but it produced no results. Elijah confronted the issue head on. If you need answers, you need an altar.

This message challenges us to examine not only our prayers, but our approach to God. The right altar brings heaven’s fire. The wrong one brings exhaustion.

What Is a Biblical Altar

In Scripture, an altar is not just a symbolic place. It is:
• A place of sacrifice
• A place of prayer
• A place of surrender
• A place of forgiveness

The word altar literally means to slaughter for sacrifice. An altar is where something dies so that spiritual life and blessing can come. God alone defines how we approach Him and what materials build His altar. We cannot shape God into what we want. We must come to Him as He commands.

Why Your Approach to God Matters

Elijah rebuilt the altar with uncut stones. This mattered because it represented God’s design, not human manipulation. We cannot alter who God is or reduce Him to someone who simply grants our requests. We do not come to God as if He is a genie or a casual provider of our desires. He is the sovereign King.

Coming boldly before the throne of grace does not mean coming with arrogance. It means approaching with humility, awe, and confidence in the access Jesus purchased for us.

You May Be Sacrificing at the Wrong Altar

The prophets of Baal sacrificed constantly. Their altar was in great condition. Yet nothing changed. Their worship brought no life.

Sometimes we sacrifice:
• Time on things that do not fulfill
• Mental energy on fear or worry
• Heart space for worldly validation
• Priorities that do not lead us toward God

We might be giving our best effort in the wrong place. And when the wrong altar thrives, the right one falls into disrepair.

Rebuilding the Altar Starts With the Heart

Elijah invited the people to come near and watch as he repaired the altar of the Lord. He reminded them of who they were and who God had made them to be. Identity must be restored before spiritual authority can operate.

A rebuilt altar recognizes:
• God’s sovereignty
• Our dependence
• The need for true repentance
• The call to surrender our own agenda

Without sacrifice, there is no fire. David refused to offer anything to God that cost him nothing. Real altars require real surrender.

Prayer is Not Casual

Quick requests alone are not altar life. A repaired altar requires our time, our focus, and our attention. It calls for a posture that seeks God’s ways rather than our own desires.

James 4 warns that we can pray and still receive nothing if our motives are self-centered. Friendship with the world and devotion to God cannot co-exist in the same heart. Submission to God leads to grace. Pride leads to resistance.

Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.

The Altar Produces Transformation

The greatest work of the altar is not what God gives us, but what God changes in us. Sometimes the answer is not the thing we want, but the heart we need.

At the altar we pray:
• Change me
• Purify my desires
• Help me handle difficulty in a way that brings You glory
• Shape my life so others see Christ in me

The altar is where we become more like Jesus.

It Is Time to Repair the Altars

God is still answering. Heaven is not silent. The question is whether we are approaching Him properly.

If you need answers
If you need breakthrough
If you need direction
If you need peace

It is time to return to the altar.

Lay down fear.
Lay down pride.
Lay down your own plans.

A restored altar restores the soul. A surrendered heart receives what only God can provide.

Full Transcript

This transcript is auto-generated and not perfect. We hope it blesses you.

00:08 – Jaime Luce (Host)
Welcome to the Jaime Luce Podcast. Thanks for taking time today to join me in a Bible study. Today we are kind of picking up where we left off last week. We are in 1 Kings, chapter 18, kings chapter 18, and we have been talking about altars and who is God, and I really felt impressed to. I want to bring I want to be careful how I say this I want to bring a word that I hope that you can hear my heart in this. I am not wanting to bring a word of correction, but a word of maybe direction that I’m hoping will help you. I’m titling this and this will probably help you know where we’re going. I’m titling this If you Need probably help. You know where we’re going. I’m titling this.

01:05
If you Need Answers, you Need an Altar. If you need answers, you need an altar. And the context of this passage in 1 Kings 18 is that the prophets of Baal, the prophets of Baal under the kingship of Ahab and Jezebel, have been for years now serving Baal and the Asherahs, these false gods, in order to attain life and prosperity. They were looking to the wrong gods, they had it all messed up and it comes to a head with Elijah’s challenging the prophets of Baal and they do everything imaginable trying to get Baal to answer them. They take extreme measures. They are, you know, screaming, jumping, crying out, cutting themselves, making just hooping and hollering all day long to get no answer. So what do you do when you don’t have answers? You rebuild the altar. The problem is that the altar that they were offering to bail on was in really good condition. They were regularly sacrificing on this altar. This altar was getting a lot of use and it was producing nothing in their lives. And the altar of the Lord the scripture tells us, and the altar of the Lord, the scripture tells us needed to be rebuilt. It not only wasn’t being used, it wasn’t only neglected, but it had been broken down. It needed to be rebuilt. And I hope you can hear me today. I don’t know what you’re facing. I don’t know the weight and the stress and the anxiety of what you’re dealing with, but if you need answers, you need an altar, you need an altar. Let me start by reading you, starting in verse.

03:26
This is chapter 18 of 1 Kings. I want to start in verse 30. It says Then Elijah said to all the people Come near to me. So all the people came near to him and he repaired the altar of the Lord that was broken down and we’ll talk in a minute about that broken down process, but he rebuilds the altar. And he rebuilds the altar In verse 31,.

04:02
It says and Elijah took twelve stones according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying Israel shall be your name. Now, what he is doing here is he is rebuilding an altar of remembrance of what God had done in establishing this people. He’s reminding them you wouldn’t be a people if God had not chosen Abraham, isaac and Jacob. And Jacob became Israel and his 12 sons were the 12 tribes of Israel, who they were. Their true identity was birthed and came from God Almighty, and I would say the same is very true for each one of us, who you truly are, who you were born to be. Everything that you are called to do comes from God Almighty. It doesn’t come from your two parents. It comes from the call of God that he sees us individually. Scripture says that he numbers the hairs on our head. He knows how many hairs each of us have on our head or how many we don’t have. He knows us by name. He formed us in our mother’s wombs. He knit us together. The scripture says that we are his handiwork. Just as he molded and created Adam and then put him to sleep and took from his side and made Eve, we too have been crafted and made by our Heavenly Father, and so this altar experience, this building of an altar, is Elijah’s way of showing the people, reminding them who they are, where they came from, who their fathers were, reminding them of their past, but taking them not through the difficulties of the past, not taking them through the circumstances they’ve been. I mean, right now they’re actually in a condition where they are in two separate kingdoms, they’re not even together as one and there’s a division. And Elijah is reminding them of who God has called them to be. He takes them from a place where they think much lower thoughts. They don’t know who they are anymore, they don’t serve God as they should. They’re serving false gods. They aren’t remembering at all who they are, where they came from, who they’re supposed to be. They have lost their identity. And here comes Elijah and he is reminding them through dramatic, supernatural means where God shows himself, shows up and shows himself to say I am God and I’m the one who named you. I’m the one who knows the plan for your life.

07:43
If you need answers, if you need answers, you need to rebuild the altar. You need to rebuild the altar, no matter what answers you need. I probably should start by just kind of giving some definitions. What is an altar? Well, if, scripturally speaking, an altar is a place to slaughter for sacrifice, it’s a place of prayer, a place of giving, a place of repentance, a place of forgiveness. The altar, though? The word altar literally does mean to slaughter for sacrifice. So in Scripture it was God and God alone.

08:50
Now, this wasn’t the case. If you served false gods, they would put them on every high hill and all over the place. They built altars everywhere, anywhere, everywhere, anywhere, everywhere. But when it came to God, god alone would determine where, when, how, why and by whom sacrifices should be made on an altar. He determined where the altar would be. He determined what the altar should look like, how it should be made, everything about the altar would be. He determined what the altar should look like, how it should be made, everything about the altar was God’s order, god’s determination.

09:34
God and God alone says how an altar is to be built, how you are to care for it, what it’s supposed to be built of the materials. You couldn’t use bricks to build an altar. God had spoken and said that you were to use uncut stones because it represented what God makes, not what man manipulates and makes, not in the shape that a man wants to make it. It had to be uncut, meaning if you found that stone, the way God made that stone, you use that stone Uncut, untouched by man’s hands.

10:19
An altar is to come before God. We don’t get to manipulate God. We don’t get to shape what we want God to look like. To shape something ourselves, with our hands, is to make an idol. It’s to form it in an image we determine. That is not what God allowed. An image we determine, that is not what God allowed To come.

10:51
A proper altar means I come the way God tells me to come, I come when he tells me to come. You know there were. They had feasts and times and ways and only certain people. I mean. That’s why King Saul was in trouble, because he offered a sacrifice. He was not allowed to offer a sacrifice. The prophet was to come and offer that sacrifice. A priest had to do that. You couldn’t just come in and do the things you wanted to do when you wanted to do them.

11:17
It was God’s determination who did what, and in order to get answers, you had to approach the way God tells us to approach. Now, approaching is also a heart, has to do with the condition of our heart, the attitudes of our heart. Approaching God had ways. That’s why God would meet with Moses face to face. What was the cry of Moses’s heart? I want to know your ways, david, too, I want to know your ways. These men came with humble hearts. They didn’t come with personal agenda. They didn’t come with their own ideas. They didn’t come with man-made ways. They understood Lord. I want to know you. I want to know your ways. How do you think, what do you feel? This was, as I’ve mentioned in the last couple of podcasts that this is the sign of a mature relationship with God, desiring to know Him, what pleases Him? Who are you, god? I want to know you. I don’t want to just ask of you. I don’t want to approach thinking I’m coming to get something from you. I’m coming to be with you, I’m coming to know you.

12:57
If you need answers, you need an altar. You need an altar. Why do you need an altar? Why do you need a place of sacrifice? Why do you need a place of slaughter? What does all that mean? I mean those are scary words, those are intimidating words, those are bloody words, those are misunderstood words. I’m going to talk about that today.

13:24
And as we look at the children of Israel and them having taken such good care of and wrongly sacrificing at the wrong altar, this pristine altar that you know was sacrificed on regularly you know was sacrificed on regularly why is it that no one noticed that they had been sacrificing on this altar for years? They had been in famine for years and if you want to understand Baal and what he was supposed to provide for them, you need to go back and listen to last week’s episode. But they didn’t notice that they were getting no answers. No one was thinking about examining why they were doing all that they were doing and none of it was proving worth it. Nothing was actually producing. None of the activities, none of the sacrifices they were making, none of the service they were giving to Baal was working. This altar wasn’t producing in their life, and we should ask the same thing of ourselves.

14:36
Now, I’m not asking you. This is not me being critical of you. I have to ask me this question. I’m asking all of us this question and we have to do it regularly. It’s a part of checking our hearts. The scripture tells us to guard our hearts, for from it flow the issues of life. We have to guard our hearts and we have to be examining our behavior. Are we living, and if we are, why? Are we living with no expectations on the things that we are sacrificing to regularly, if we seem to think that we are giving our all and we’re doing all we know to do and we’re not seeing any results? Now, there could be reasons for that. There could be good reasons for that. There is a time and a season for everything, and you have to plant before you can reap. So sometimes you’re in a planting season and you’re not going to reap as soon as you plant.

15:44
I’ve told this story before. In fact, my sister just spoke at a women’s event this past weekend and she used this story too. You can look this up. But the Chinese bamboo tree when you plant it, it will show no growth for five years, no growth for five years, but in the fifth year it shoots up. I think it’s like 90 feet in one year you can actually physically watch it grow. Literally, you can see it grow. That’s how fast it grows and the reason it’s underground, showing no growth for five years, is because what’s going to take place in that fifth year, and the amount of growth and the weight of the bamboo tree that’s going to come up, has to have a root system that can sustain that kind of growth, that can bear under the weight and be able to produce such growth.

16:43
So sometimes the really big things in our life that come at us suddenly, that seem like nothing has happened for so long, and suddenly the answer comes it’s because that root system took those five years to truly grow and go so deep that it could sustain the foundation of what was there, could could sustain the suddenly could sustain the growth we’ve all known of stories of children, actors, who were thrust into limelight and it destroyed their lives. It destroyed their lives because you can’t. The same thing happens with many athletes they come from. Many of them come from a household where finances are a challenge. I mean you could have some that really were struggling and all of a sudden they make it to stardom and all this money comes in and they just no one’s taught them. They have no foundation of knowing how to handle money, no way to know what to do with it, no way to understand how you sustain it, how you keep it, how you learn to multiply it so that in years down the road you still have money taking care of you. The same thing happens so many times to people who win the lottery If you have a poor mindset before winning, you will lose it all and be poor again. The root system is not there. The foundation, the groundwork was not laid to produce the fruit that was necessary to sustain that suddenly in their life.

18:25
And so we have to take notice. We have to look at what’s going on in our lives that we aren’t seeing a production of something. It could be a seasonal reason, it could be good reason why it’s not. But if you know that you haven’t necessarily sown for all those years and you know you don’t have this amazing root system going on but you’re not seeing answers in your life, I need to show you the connection and we need to connect the dots here. Connect the dots here. Maybe. Maybe if we stopped and did this examination of the sacrifice that we’re making without seeing results, maybe if we took the time to see that we might notice.

19:21
Now this isn’t true for everyone, so please don’t hear what I’m not saying. But if the shoe fits, wear it, because we want truth. It’s truth that sets us free. If I can get truth, if I’ve been deceived and I can know truth and I can do something different and I can get out of this, I can get an answer. Well, wisdom says I want that answer, even if it confronts me, even if it confronts me. That’s why the scripture tells us that this word of God is meant to not only encourage us, but to correct us. It’s supposed to correct our path, it’s supposed to make sure we’re on the right path, and sometimes I need this word to convict my heart, to help me.

19:59
See, I might be sacrificing at the wrong altar. I might be sacrificing at the altars of Baal. I might be expecting answers from an altar that will never produce answers for me Never. No matter how many sacrifices I make on it, no matter what I do, no matter if I’m giving my life’s blood for that, it won’t produce an answer if I’m at the wrong altar. I need to be at the right altar. It won’t produce an answer if I’m at the wrong altar. I need to be at the right altar. Maybe maybe, if we realized that we were serving the wrong things, sacrificing at the wrong altars, that we would see a possible condition that that the right altar is in. Maybe, if I look in my heart, I can recognize that the altar I’m sacrificing at not only is it not producing, but it’s in good condition. I sacrifice at it regularly. But have I, if I can notice it’s the wrong altar? Maybe, maybe then that will help me to see that the right altar is in disrepair. Maybe the right altar has been knocked down. Maybe my faith has waned because I’ve waited a long time and that altar isn’t built up the way it’s supposed to be built up. Maybe I don’t spend the time that I need at that altar. Maybe I’ve been giving my time somewhere else, thinking I don’t have enough time.

21:38
I should have looked up this quote for you. I don’t remember exactly who said this quote. I know it was a really great man of God. I can tell you that much and I’ll look it up for you. You could probably find it if you want to Google this.

21:53
But there was a great man of God who said I have so much to do today. I’m paraphrasing I have so much to do today that I don’t dare start the day with at least three hours of prayer. I don’t have enough time today to mess around, so I better make sure I spend at least three hours in prayer today. That’s a paraphrase that we tend to operate. Opposite of that, we think I don’t have time, I don’t have time. You know, I only have time for a moment. Hi God, good morning, god, go with me. God Bless my day. God, instead of knowing I’ve got so much that’s so important today, I don’t dare attempt those things until I have truly been at your altar, oh God, that I have been with you, that I know your heart, that I know your direction for the day, that I know where this is, what the goal is, what the goal should be, that I have right expectations. And maybe if we saw the condition of the right altar and what condition it was, in that, we would finally see the real issue and understand why we haven’t heard from heaven yet. I mean, sometimes that’s the greatest aha moment just to realize what I’ve been doing wrong, where I’ve gotten off, what the problem is, why hasn’t God answered me yet? Just to get that answer sometimes is the greatest answer.

23:34
Elijah, in this text, didn’t ask God to answer until he made the people to see how fruitless their worship was when they were worshiping Baal. Fruitless their worship was when they were worshiping Baal. He had them go first, do all their antics, all the usual practices, all the things they did, and help them to see. It produced nothing. Even those who were priests, who should have been able to get a response these are people who gave their life to serve Baal Should have been able to show them how to do this by the means which they do it. And boy were they carrying on, putting on quite a show, but it produced nothing.

24:22
Elijah then made the people to see how the first step was to repair the altar A necessary step. You can’t make a proper sacrifice until you’ve got a proper altar. You can’t make a proper sacrifice until you’ve got a proper altar altar. My tip for the day, my instruction, my here’s what you need to do for today. If you have a broken down altar, and you know it, you know it. Watch and inquire about how someone you admire, their altar, you admire their prayer life. You admire, you know, they know how to do that.

25:16
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26:13
Watch them, watch how they live, watch how they go to that altar, watch how they pray, listen how they pray. Let them speak the example into your life. Seek it out, make it your endeavor. Elijah literally said let me read you the verse again. He tells the people in verse 30,. Elijah said to all the people come near to me. So they all came near to him. He’s like I want you to see this. Come watch what I’m gonna do.

26:52
Get yourself, if you need one, a godly mentor, someone who will tell you the truth. Not someone who’s gonna just tell you what you want to hear. Not someone who’s just gonna be nice to you and make sure you have an uplifting, encouraging word for the the day. What if, what you know, some of the best coaches in football are some of the roughest, toughest guys and they get in and say why’d you do that? You know you should have been in there doing this. Next time, do this. And they sound harsh, but those players know he’s right, I need to do that. If I do that, that’s the result I’ll get. And sometimes I feel that way. Sometimes I feel like I know I’m saying things and it can sound harsh and I’m just saying, but you know it’ll get results.

27:36
If you need answers, you need to repair the altar. You need an altar. Find somebody to watch them, learn from them, be counseled by them, be corrected by them, so that you can get the results that you need, because isn’t that what we’re after? Isn’t the goal? To get the results right. Okay.

28:02
Elijah didn’t ask God to answer until he made the people see how fruitless their worship was to Baal. Even those priests couldn’t get answers. You can’t give the sacrifice until you have an altar. David knew this. King David said in 2 Samuel 24, 24, I can’t offer to God that which cost me nothing. Now he was talking about purchasing land and actually making it cost him before he offered a sacrifice in order to stay the plague, to make sure that the plague stopped and the people were saved. He couldn’t just get the people saved. It couldn’t be that. His heart truly desired the right thing. He had already repented before God. He had already told God that he was the one. God had confronted him. You were wrong, you did wrong, and this is the consequence of that behavior. David didn’t get mad that he had a consequence. He said I’d rather fall into the hand of God than the hands of men. He could trust that God would at some point be more merciful than man would be. So he was still seeking God for the answer and at one point he realized he could go and he could sacrifice. He could come before God and come before the altar and ask God to stop it. But in order to do that, it had to cost him. It had to sacrifice. You can’t sacrifice without an altar. David understood this.

29:28
We think that, to you know, we throw up. I’ve heard people say throw up prayers I hate that term, throw up prayers but you get the idea Throw up requests. You know, that’s not an active prayer life. I can’t just, you know, be going along driving down the road of life and think that I’m, you know, I’m shooting up these prayers. Okay, god, today I need you to do this. Don’t forget to do this for me, god, I need you, god. Where are you? God, I’m throwing up these prayers but I’m never at an altar. I’m just, you know, yelling out my requests. That’s not an active prayer life. Wrong, it’s wrong, it’s not. I’m not saying that it’s wrong to cry out to God. I’m not saying that it’s wrong that when you come into a crisis and you just start praying, that’s okay, that’s actually really okay. I’m talking about the casualness of the heart in approaching God, the place of the altar, the place of sacrifice, where I sacrifice my flesh, my time, my agenda to come before an awesome God and make my requests known.

30:39
God isn’t a genie. I know you’ve heard that. He’s not the genie in the bottle, he’s not the great Santa Claus that I ask for my favorite things. He’s not a doting grandpa, he’s a father. A father corrects, a father instructs. Grandpas maybe not so much Sometimes our grandpas can, you know, be gentle on us, easy on us, let us slide with things. God’s not a grandpa.

31:10
God cares about the destiny for your life. He cares about the condition of your heart. He cares about the condition of your thought life. He cares about how to truly cause you to prosper in this life. But for eternity. We get our eyes so locked on this life that we don’t remember and realize this life. Scripture tells us our life is but a vapor, it’s gone. It’s here one day, it’s gone tomorrow. Eternity is forever. We need to live with eternity in mind, the time that never stops, where we will be living for eternity. That’s what matters. Getting us from point A to point B is what is important, not just how we live at point A.

32:02
If God is not a genie and God is not a Santa Claus and God is not our great you know great grandpa or our grandpa, and he’s God, it’s important how we approach him. He is God, almighty. God almighty, sovereign, omnipotent, god, all-knowing who. This God that we are to serve has a plan and a purpose for everything and everyone that he has created. We demean him. Hear my heart. We demean him by how we think about him. We demean him by how we approach him. We can get so used to and so familiar mistakenly so familiar with God, with godly terms, with church life, with church people. We can get so casual and familiar that we don’t mean to. But we demean him in how we approach him, how we think about him.

33:29
Peter, there was a time when the disciple Peter forgot who he was talking to and he rebuked Jesus. He tried to correct what Jesus said, he tried to undo and correct what Jesus had just said. And Jesus turned to Peter and rebuked openly Peter in front of the other disciples and said get behind me, Satan. Now that’s quite a rebuke. And if he will do that to his, you know, strong rock, I will build my church on this rock and the gates of hell won’t prevail against it. Peter, that man hasn’t, you know, revealed this to you, that my Father in heaven’s revealed this to you.

34:11
This man, this Peter, in front of all the disciples, not quietly and off in the corner to make sure he didn’t get his feelings hurt openly rebuked him saying and exposing what spirit Peter was speaking from. And he said and exposing what spirit Peter was speaking from. And he said you are an offense to me. Can you imagine if Jesus said that to you? Oh, my gosh, if he said that to me, I would be so, so broken and probably so embarrassed. And so so many things right, so many things, all the things you are an offense to me.

34:48
Why did he say he was an offense? He explained to him what was so offensive. You are an offense to me for you are not mindful of the things of God. The statement you just made exposed your heart and you are not thinking the way God thinks right now. You are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men. What did that point out? He’s pointing out that Peter had and we do this too. This is us too. We have a lower base thinking. We have a natural, worldly, realm way of thinking versus a heavenly higher way of thinking. He pointed out that the lower base thinking was offensive, that our thought life is offensive to God, that it’s actually considered from the devil the devil. And that’s how we approach God so many times, with our agenda, with what we think is right. We want to correct him.

36:02
My pastor’s wife spoke on Sunday and her message was phenomenal. But she pointed out how Martha kept trying to tattle and correct Mary and she was trying to tell Jesus. Now you go and you tell her what she’s doing wrong. She was trying to command Jesus, tell him what to do. Not a good idea. Isaiah 55, verse 8 and 9, says for my thoughts are not your thoughts this is God speaking. Neither are your ways, my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. We must repair our altars. We don’t just pray. We repair the way that we approach him, the way that we prepare to enter his presence. I can’t just make the sacrifice of prayer and praise. I need to fix my approach. I need to repair the altars. You might say no, jaime.

37:34
The scripture tells us that we are to come boldly before the throne room of grace. Yes, we are, but let’s talk about that for a minute, because you’ve just made my point. Where is he? Where is this God we are approaching. He’s on the throne. He’s on the throne Even today. Today you don’t just King Charles over in England. You don’t get to just march yourself over to the king any old way you please. You may not get an audience with him. Esther had to approach the king and she knew he didn’t summon me. So I’m not supposed to approach him because he didn’t summon me. You better fast and pray that I can approach him, and only if he holds out the gold scepter to me can I come to him and not be killed for doing this.

38:25
There is a right way to approach Now. What does it mean then? If the scripture tells us to come boldly, what does that mean? You come boldly because you understand where you’re going, to whom you are going, and you understand what power and authority that the one you’re approaching has. That is a position of the heart, a position of the mind, a position you take knowing. You come boldly because you know who he is, you know his authority, you know his power. I come boldly because I know what he’s done for me, that he has made the way by his sacrifice. He has blood because I was put on the altar on your behalf because of my righteousness, because of my faith in you that you could come to me. You can come now boldly because I’ve made the way. You’re allowed to have an altar, you’re allowed to have a prayer life, you’re allowed to come through this door and have access to me. I hope that’s making sense to you. It’s with that knowledge and the fact that I have a relationship, a repaired altar, that I can now come boldly.

40:16
Hebrews 4.14 says, therefore, since we have a great high priest because who could come before the altar? The high priest. Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, a great high priest who has ascended into, come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in the time of need. Well, what did that scripture say that we needed? What are we to come boldly looking for, according to that scripture, to help us not to sin, to help us not to fall victim to temptation. He was in all points tempted, yet without sin. That’s what made him the great high priest. That’s what made the way for us to come boldly looking for that grace the throne room of grace where I can obtain mercy and find grace to help in the time of need.

41:49
So in my time of need, in my temptation, I need mercy and I need grace. So, when I come, my heart position is one to say Lord, I’m not asking you for things, I’m asking you for mercy. I’m asking you for mercy, I’m asking you for grace. Help me to act, to think, to do according to what makes your heart. Pleased that I am able to live a life that is worthy of your sacrifice today. Give me my daily bread, lord, what I need for today, a life that is worthy of your sacrifice today. Give me my daily bread, lord, what I need for today to accomplish what you have purposed for me to accomplish today.

42:42
To have that kind of relationship means that you regularly find yourself at the altar of sacrifice. Your altar is not in disrepair when you are boldly asking on a regular basis for God’s grace to not sin and to live as he would desire for you to live. We too often look at the altar of prayer like we’re going up to the bank’s cashier’s window to ask for, or to the cashier at the store and ask for, what’s behind the counter. God forgive us. Forgive us for not approaching him as almighty God and savior, for not correcting our heart’s posture. Yes, it’s okay to answer. I mean to ask for answers to our needs. That’s okay because he promises to supply our need according to his riches and glory, by Christ Jesus. That’s Philippians 4.19. But what if the answer we are looking for is like Peter, in that we are looking to advance the plans of man, our plans, our boss’s plans, our children’s plans, instead of the plans of God?

44:09
I want to read a decent portion of scripture here in James, james, chapter 4, and I’m going to read verses 3 to 10. Listen carefully to this passage. It says you asked and you do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses. I mean, that’s a sharp, that’s a sharp statement to make that by doing this he’s calling them adulterers and adulteresses. In fact, there’s a note I’m going to turn to it real quick before I continue on in my Bible addressing that statement.

44:56
Adulterers and adulteresses this statement is a metaphorical term used in the Old Testament for those who break their vows to love and serve God and follow instead idols. It’s an illicit affair with worldliness and results in estrangement and hostility with God. Think about that for a minute. It’s a powerful statement. Adulterers and adulteresses. Do you not know?

45:41
This is the scripture. Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the scripture says in vain that the spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously Again speaking about that marriage type relationship and that word right there yearns for us jealously. The spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously means we can’t be allowed a divided heart. We can’t have a divided heart. It has to be fully Jesus, not my agenda, his. But he gives more grace. That’s what we talked about in the other passage in Hebrews 4.14, the throne room of grace, but he gives more grace.

46:46
Therefore, he says God resists the proud. That to me, is coming boldly before the throne, but that means coming as a proud person. I’m coming arrogantly. There’s a difference between coming boldly and coming arrogantly. There’s a difference between coming boldly and coming arrogantly. And so many times I think people, when they say it I come boldly before the throne room of God, they’re actually. You can hear the difference. There’s an arrogance about that. Boldness is one thing. You can be terrified and be bold. You can do something and be bold and say something and be terrified. You can have awe at the same moment. There’s a difference between boldness and arrogance. We don’t approach the throne of God with arrogance. We do, because of our relationship with him. Approach him with boldness. Let’s go on with the scripture. Approach him with boldness. Let’s go on with the scripture. Let me back up.

47:47
Therefore, he says God resists the proud, but gives grace to who, to the humble. Therefore, submit to God. He gives us instructions. Submit to God. Resist the devil. It’s like we read in Hebrews Resist temptation, like with Peter. Resist the temptation to have the desire for the will of man or for yourself, for selfishness. Resist that it’s a temptation to sin. Resist the devil and he will flee from you, which is exactly what took place.

48:32
This is the Bible. Defining the Bible, meaning they’re talking about. Jesus modeled this for us in the desert and the enemy came with temptations to please man, and Jesus resisted the devil and the devil had to flee from him. Let’s go on in the scripture. Draw near to God. That’s the altar. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts. You double-minded. He’s again. We’ve been talking about this for the last couple weeks.

49:15
Elijah had said how long will you falter between two opinions? You have a divided heart. You adulterers, you adulteresses. You have a divided heart. You can’t be thinking about the desires of man and, at the same time, be wishing for the desires of God. We’ve got to have a heart that is fully surrendered to him. Let’s go on, lament and mourn and weep. That is the repaired altar, folks. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. That’s sacrifice lifting.

50:05
Today, approach his precious altar, his presence, and offer yourself as a living sacrifice with an undivided heart. If you need to hear from heaven, you need an altar. The altar is a place of sacrifice. Many times I will be closing with this many times the sacrifice is not coming, asking for the thing you want, but instead asking to be changed, asking to be changed, asking for God to help us deal with it in a way that brings glory to God. Whatever you’re dealing with, lord, help me to deal with this in a manner that glorifies you, that people can see because they’re watching how I’m dealing with this. May it glorify you. May my actions, my thoughts, my desires glorify you, god, in a way that pleases his heart To live, desiring to think his higher thoughts and to walk in his higher ways, so that we are changed into his image, is the appropriate heart posture of an altar. That is the goal to become like Christ. That is the definition of a Christian, little Christ doing it just like Jesus would do it.

51:49
It’s time to repair the altars. It’s time to slaughter for sacrifice. That is what an altar is. My agenda, my sin, my flesh, my worldly desires, my thoughts, my carnality Make me more like Jesus. It’s time to repair the altars.

52:15
If you need answers, you need an altar. Let me pray for you, father. We just ask you right now, in the name of Jesus, that you would speak to our hearts today, that we would see clearly, that we would hear your heart, that we would approach you with humility, knowing how much we need you, that we would make it our desire. Father, we’re asking for the grace today, the grace, the grace to deal with the things that try our patience, that rub our flesh the wrong way, that exhaust us, that overwhelm us. Give us your grace. May what we do and how we do it, father, please, you Show us what will please. You Speak to us the answers. We come to your altar today, asking you to meet our needs, to speak clearly, to give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen, amen.

53:50
Thank you for taking time in the Word today. I pray this challenges you. It sure challenges me. We need to rebuild our altars. Find somebody who you admire their altar and watch, learn. Let’s correct our heart posture. Let’s come humbly yet boldly, to the throne room of grace. God is waiting and he will answer. I’d love to hear from you, if you haven’t done so already subscribe, hit that like button, give us that thumbs up. Share this with somebody who needs to hear this today. I pray this was an encouragement to you. I hope you could hear my heart today. I don’t want to bring condemnation to you. There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, but today we take correction and motivation for the way that pleases God right, for a way that leads to prospering and to fulfilling his purpose for our lives. That’s where we will find satisfaction and the answers that our soul so desperately needs. Make his word your bread today. Make his companionship your desire today, and you will have a successful day. God bless you. We’ll see you next time. Bye-bye.